Anxiety - consultation cancelled due to kids noise

What do you mean by tried taking the kids out the room?

Sorry but your answer is a bit melodramatic. Of course we don't know what you are going through, you only gave us so much information. Do you think anyone is a mind reader? Plus, even though you are going through some stuff, this has nothing to do with the initial question you asked. You were given advice that the set up is not right, take that on the chin and be more organised next time or you will be out of pocket again. Practical, no non-sense advice. Also, your husband should be in there on his own, he needs to face his anxiety and trust the consultant knows what he is doing, unless he has learning disabilities he is an adult and should have the freedom of talking freely. What if some of his anxiety is related to you? He probably wouldn't say this in front of you from fear of not offending you but is important for the consultant to know all his stressors to help him find strategies to cope with his anxiety no matter where is coming from. I hope it makes sense. And don't feel so attacked, no one attacked you, they just questioned the situation itself. Take the advice, good luck to you and your husband.

I had low cost counselling from a local charity. They insisted I had to be at home where I was likely to be disturbed by family who I was talking about, and would not let me be out in a local green space where I had a small chance of being disturbed by passers-by.
I do think counsellors should be more understanding.

Kindly OP, is English a 2nd language for you? I suspect some of the confusion from other posters is the way you have phrased things when you actually meant something else.

Did the counsellors T&C's have any info about ensuring the session was quiet and private before starting? What is their policy on cancelling a session due to DH being in an unsuitable environment? The noise might have stopped, but maybe your DH was looking distressed or distracted on the call trying to find you- hence cancelling it? I would have thought the therapist would have explained though.

I WFH and have noise cancelling headphones. I'm amazed how much they block things out things such as my dog barking or the door bell.

You can only go forward from this and plan the next session appropriately. Wishing you all the best xxx

Take the kids out! It’s not difficult.

when I have appointments with people in their homes I ask them to turn the telly off as it is distracting for everyone. I’d leave if there were screaming kids and we couldn’t have a serious conversation

OP, please don’t feel bad. Your circumstances are your circumstances and all you and your DH can do is to learn from them and plan differently for next time.

The doctor can decide whether or not the consultation can go ahead and they aren’t being unreasonable especially if information received before the appointment was clear about making sure interruptions were avoided. Learn from this and move on. I’m sorry the appointment didn’t go ahead as planned. Good luck for next time!

I think it's a safeguarding matter in regards to the OP's dc too. The therapist doesn't know what will be said and it would be unprofessional to continue in earshot of children.

Carsmad is right about this.

I am sorry that you feel more upset than you did, but there are quite strict lines in the sand with online therapy and appointments, and the 'online' aspect of it can be stressful in different ways when the Teams/Zoom aspect is a feature instead of face to face. Your DH must absolutely learn how to take responsibility and handle that part himself (or I foresee it will become a bigger stressor for him) and to be able to react to any online glitches when nobody else is there. I have had 1-1 online counselling and also had to be the 'tech person' for a lot of different online formats that involve young users, with Teams and Zoom. I hate the 2 tools with a passion, but there are essentials to get to grips with rather than just opting out. Not being bailed out (or bending someone else to do something for you, such as the therapist to have to rethink their working styes) is actually quite a good stepping stone in the case of anxiety problems.

If the children were ill enough not to be able to manage the routine, then it may have been better for him to try to reschedule if they ideally needed both of you.

I think you've learned a valuable lesson through this experience.
When scheduling an appointment it has to be done in a conducive environment, no interruptions, no background noise and each side able to hear the other clearly.
Good luck going forward.

The therapist didn't get annoyed at her patient with anxiety, she (quite rightly) was annoyed at the screaming children in the background, and with OP for not taking them out of the rooom promptly.

I have anxiety and have online therapy. This is not normal and my therapists wouldn’t be ok with me saying I couldn’t even handle a session on my own. So you are very unreasonable to say your crying loud children were left unattended elsewhere and you expect the therapist to just listen to the sound because your husband won’t even do his therapy appt alone.

I think it's a safeguarding matter in regards to the OP's dc too. The therapist doesn't know what will be said and it would be unprofessional to continue in earshot of children.

Separately, some posters really love kicking someone when they're down.

OP, it's a learning experience but what a shame you are getting abuse from posters when your family is already struggling. So sorry.

I've had work calls (not therapy) where the disruption by children and/or animals is such that I can only hear one word in three and have to constantly ask the person to repeat themselves. I can just about muddle through this on a short call with specific aims. I can't imagine that this is remotely appropriate for a therapy session. It certainly would not make for a calm therapeutic atmosphere.

OP and DH do need to think about creating an appropriate environment for the call. If the children were in another room with (presumably) doors closed and still the noise was distracting, they must have been pretty loud.

I do online therapy and background noise can be very disturbing. My therapist has a dog (outside her room) that occasionally barks and it is suprising how much it disrupts the session. We have worked together long enough that we ignore it to see if it calms quickly, or she leaves for a minute or two to put the dog somewhere totally out of earshot. But in the very early sessions it is pretty likely she would have re-scheduled (at no cost to me given it was her dog). In this situation, which sounds like a first consultation, the therapist and client have no relationship to fall back on; quiet and privacy is essential. It is entirely possible that the OP's DH was in fact displaying anxiety or upset or whatever at the noise and how can the therapist get a proper impression of the situation in those circumstances? It's not only a waste of time, it could actually be counter-productive.

Try headphones next time as it blocks out a lot of the background noise if using microphone and headphones rather than laptop speaker.

It is disappointing, hopefully rearranged soon.

I thought that that therapy sessions had to be private?

I guess if it’s so loud you can’t hear each other and if DH was getting more anxious over it then it would have been pointless carrying on.

Then why didn’t you arrange for someone to have the kids if they are not old enough to not cry if you are busy doing something and can not give them attention!!

I'm a therapist and I would not have done what the dr did.
You have to accept if you do online sessions that there will be noise. The most important thing for me is if the client is comfortable.

Must have been loud for a call to be ended.

I have online therapy and live in a house with thin walls.

If the therapist or consultant can see or hear children, then it is not a private appointment, and they therefore must cancel or postpone.

I don’t think anyone is judging you as such. But there cannot be any distractions such as present or crying children. If that’s the situation then there’s no point in booking the appointment.

Your partner needs noise cancelling headphones, using a microphone that can be muted, and the children need to be completely out of the way and not disrupting the appointment or out of the house. If they can’t be removed from the situation then you need to postpone the appointment.

Ah ok it was maybe said in an update or so

YANBU OP. People have busy lives and things cant always be perfect, surely that's part of what they should be talking to your husband about rather than causing him more stress? I don't know why they couldn't have just said - if you can get the children out of the way this will be more effective and carried on. Do make sure they reschedule and don't charge you again, unless it is in their Ts and Cs a room must be silent I dont think they can just take your money and run.

Not at all. What a stupid thing to say. We lived in a flat when my husband was at uni. Unfortunately it was lockdown. I tried mu best but that is their home and it's fucking freezing out.

Sorry OP but if the kids were disruptive enough to be an issue for this appointment then they were well enough to be bundled up and taken outside for a few minutes. What did you expect the therapist to do? It's not fair or safe for them to try and have very serious conversations whilst little ones are listening and being distracting. You both need to be a lot more accomodating if you want any hope of treating your DH. That's on you not your therapist.

This will be my last post as it’s derailing the thread.

I work out of the home. I have no choice. In the past year I have rang organisations where the person is at home. I have had my conversation interrupted by someone’s child shouting MUUUUMMMM as well as the doorbell ringing and they cut me off to go and answer it.

My computer system stopped working. I rang IT. The man I spoke to was working from home. And as a result was unable to access what he needed to fix my system apparently. Cool. What an I supposed to do?? I can’t work either now! Ridiculous.

I have people attend appointments with me who are “working from home”. I had a client mid appointment leap up and say sorry my boss is ringing I’m supposed to be at work and disappeared out the building. Then came back in 15 minutes later expecting me to carry on but they had missed the remainder of their appointment. My next client was now waiting. They complained then refused to pay me. (I have clients almost daily tell me they are “working” so need to keep their phone in their hand and may need to answer mid appointment).

I have no issue with people working from home if they have the ability and space. But too many people either can’t do their full job, can’t concentrate on their job, or are trying to do other things while “working” in order to avoid taking annual leave etc.